Seattle Mayor Ed Murray recently announced a plan that asks resident to approve a $930 million transportation levy for the purpose of “transit reliability and access.” The plan adds $30 million to what Murray originally proposed and relies on a whopping 2.1 percent increase in taxable property—that’s more than double what Seattleites currently pay.
As Dori Monson points out, the new proposal reveal the astonishing hypocrisy of Murray and other Seattle officials who, for quite some time, have been grumbling over the high cost of living in Seattle. Particularly, the city’s high rent. MyNorthwest.com,
“But won’t increasing property taxes make Seattle less affordable than it is now? Dori points out that Mayor Murray says he wants to find ways to combat income inequality and unaffordable housing, but he’s increasing property taxes.
“‘I’d love to find out … Why he does things to make it worse,’ Dori said.
“There’s another concerning fact about the property tax increase: It’s not just property owners that will vote on it.
“‘There are thousands of people who are in apartments who are property tax exempt,’ Dori said. ‘They have no skin in the game. They can vote for higher and higher taxes and not be affected at all.’
‘Strap in,’ Dori added. ‘It’s going to be a bumpy ride.’”
Monson is correct. Murray’s plan would, ironically, make Seattle even more unaffordable. However, housing renters do have “skin in the game”… they just don’t realize that they do. Simply put, landlords often deal with an increase in property taxes by raising rents.
You can listen to Monson’s commentary here.
It’s like paying people $15 an hour to start… prices go up… job availability suffers…
Exactly. That’ll be a nice double-whammy, won’t it? Higher rents and fewer jobs.
I smell Detroit… Baltimore… etc… although I think it will be more like NYC/SF the cost of living will just rise to a stupid number…
“‘There are thousands of people who are in apartments who are property tax exempt,’ Dori said. ‘They have no skin in the game. They can vote for higher and higher taxes and not be affected at all.’
What an idiot. Of the many rental-increase notices I’ve received in Seattle over the years, I can’t recall a single one which didn’t list property taxes as a justification — it was often the very first factor cited.
It’s like paying people $15 an hour to start… prices go up… job availability suffers…
… no facts are provided…
“Of the many rental-increase notices I’ve received in Seattle over the years”
Sounds like you’ve got a lot of them. Roughly how many are we talking? I think I’ve got a sum total of 2 in my entire life and if I remember right neither one mentioned any justification at all. …Made up facts are provided…
Sounds like you’ve got a lot of them. Roughly how many are we talking?
We covered this in another thread, since you insisted upon dragging it over there for some reason. Bottom line is that rents have been increasing steeply in Seattle of late, and property taxes offer a convenient excuse to raise rent while neither improving the property, nor improving the level of service to tenants. Ironically, this may make renters *more* likely to vote for the transport-improvement levy: if rents will rise anyway, why not get something for the higher payments?
It’s also amusing to note the story behind this story. Seattle’s rents are rising because the city is a boom town. Construction cranes dot the horizon, Amazon and others are hiring like crazy, and so the demand for apartments keeps pace with the rapid increase in supply — developers are on pace to add more units in 2015 than in any other calendar year of the city’s history.
All of this in a place which has been dominated by liberals for decades, and has some of the most progressive public policies in the country. According to the WPC and this blog, such policies should long ago have turned Seattle into an impoverished wasteland. Without the abject and obvious failure of this site’s ideology, posts like this one wouldn’t even be possible!
We look forward to many more posts about how Seattle’s economic success is creating exactly the opposite problems from the ones right-wing blogs have predicted.
Cost go’s up, pass it on, that’s just the way it go’s. If you don’t like that then the choice is to move somewhere else, pretty simple. Next please.
Sounds like another attempt to squeeze tax payers to pay for more waste in government. Gov can’t get Hwy 16 & I-5 hooked up per spec., messed up the new bridge pontoons, messed up the hwy 99 digging project. The state estimated 2 years on the hwy 16 Illahee overpass, the contractor got it done in 1. Lottery was going to take care of schools for forever. Casino’s was going to take care of another promise, but didn’t. Is the Kingdom paid for yet? Just another spending spree. While vacationing in Hawaii I read Inslee gets on F for governor and his budget.
I hold little hope that WA will ever vote for leaders that don’t think they can take as much money from the citizens as they want to, when they want to, for whatever they want to. My modest single family home is taxed over $6K/year. It’s going up for sale in 6 weeks and I’m moving to 10 acres in another state where I will pay just $400 (four hundred just so you know it wasn’t a typo). How is that possible you ask? Because most of the voters own property.
Renters have no perception that a property tax increase will touch them because it is built into their rent and they don’t see the bill.They pay it of course via rent and rent increases although many landlords eat most of those increases in an effort to keep their tenants or due to lease agreements. I would double any tax increase on anything and raise the rent accordingly. Maybe then those who are fine with taxing the other guy would learn a lesson and stop voting for confiscatory taxes and the politicians that enact them.
Good bye WA and good luck saving WA from a fate like Detroit or Baltimore, only state wide. I think you have a better chance of hitting the Lotto.
Spot on Jay. We are contemplating selling our home as well and moving out of state. Our taxes went up 20% just this year and are now over $9k in La Conner. Screwed on every front by the county, state and tribal governments.
I hope for your sake you make the call while prices are up. It’s taken since 4/2014 of planning and preparation for us. Good luck to you.
Has anyone told those idiots that 62% of Americans are living from paycheck to paycheck and have more credit card debt than savings? They are already struggling, the cost of food, housing and utilities is a huge burden. How about learning how to manage by trimming down expenses and making every dollar in taxes count? By the way, just throwing more money at a problem doesn’t really solve it.. or make it any better…
Apartment renters are not exempt, it gets passed from the property owner to the renters as increased rent. All taxes end up being paid by the individuals. Corporations never pay any taxes, they only collect taxes from their customers. Any corporate tax is an operating expense passed to customers. Corporations are government tax collectors. I haven’t voted for any tax in decades, always NO.
I hope someone in Seattle saved the billboard.
Seattle area landlords are no strangers to raising rents! –
Of course the increase in property taxes will be paid by all! –
With no increase in profit to property owners.
Not confined to rent payments.
Prices of all goods and services will continue to increase, because of increased property taxes.
Overall costs of living will increase for everyone,
with zero increase in profits to anyone.
That’s how taxes “work” / sabotage.